• VinegarChunks@lemmus.org
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        3
        ·
        2 hours ago

        With a lot of things:

        You start off with no knowledge, and it’s a big mystery.

        You gain some knowledge and feel like you have understanding.

        You gain a lot more knowledge and you learn how much more there is that isn’t known.

        The President is either at stage 1 or stage 3, take your pick.

    • pmk@piefed.ca
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      8
      ·
      7 hours ago

      Whenever I think about magnets I remember this Feynman interview where someone asks him why magnets behave the way they do, and he says that to answer a “why”-question you need a foundation where something is agreed to be true, and it seems like for electromagnetic forces we end up in " because that’s how the universe is apparently".

        • oce 🐆@jlai.lu
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          1
          ·
          29 minutes ago

          This seems to be easily said of anyone trying to popularize science philosophy.

      • porous_grey_matter@lemmy.ml
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        9
        ·
        6 hours ago

        Sure, but between nothing and the axioms of the standard model we end up with a fairly comprehensive description which can predict how different kinds of magnets behave in a wide variety of situations.

          • porous_grey_matter@lemmy.ml
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            2
            ·
            3 hours ago

            No, the theory of electromagnetism and by extension physics in general is knowing how it works. How to use it is engineering, a different set of knowledge which we also have some of.